Believe it or not, I
woke at 3:30 am, before the alarm was set to go off.
Sleeping before a Disney trip is not one of my strong
suits. I used the extra half an hour to do a bit more
preparation for our "reconnaissance mission"
(research trip) and to double-check that I'd packed
everything I needed. By 5:00 am, we were on our way to
Detroit Metro Airport (which is conveniently located only
20 minutes away).

Everything went smoothly at check-in with Northwest
(we use E-Tickets and can usually get checked in in under
ten minutes). We picked up Cinnabons and caffe mochas
(our airport ritual) on the way to our gate. We board our
plane, it leaves on time (7:00 am), and the trip goes
without a hitch. The airline serves their usual
banana-cereal-bagel breakfast in-flight and we partake,
knowing we won't be eating lunch until later in the day.
We touch-down at 9:30 and make our way to baggage. We've
been in this airport so many times now that we could
virtually do this stuff with our eyes closed. Even so, a
smooth flight is a luxury for some, and we're grateful
for an easy trip.

As we come down the escalators heading towards baggage
claim, Ian of Tiffany Town Car is there to meet us. We
pick up the luggage and head towards Disney. Along the
way, we chat with Ian and tell him about our plans for
our short jaunt. This is our first time meeting Ian, whom
we've heard much about through our readers and fellow
fans. Now, I have to tell you, I have this thing about
not telling people that we write a book about Walt Disney
World when we first meet them. I really want to be
treated like every other traveler, so I can hear what our
readers would hear (even if I've heard it a million
times). This time, after about ten minutes, we let Ian in
on the fact that we write PassPorter (you can't fool
these Tiffany Town Car folks). And to our surprise, he
said he'd heard of it and could swear he saw the cover
before. So we chatted about PassPorter and the Millennium
Celebration until we arrived at the entrance to Coronado
Springs at around 10:30. Before we parted company, we
gave Ian an autographed copy of PassPorter to read. Ian
was a good driver and we would recommend him and Tiffany
Town Car to anyone (and we do).

Registration at Coronado Springs went smoothly. Before
heading in to actually register, we shuffled luggage
items a bit so we had the items we want to carry around
the parks (waist packs for each of us, plus a backpack
with rain gear and some research materials). Bell
services then took our luggage and gave us our luggage
claim tickets. Inside, I marveled at the beautiful
fountain, tiles, and high ceilings while we waited for a
cast member. (We've been here before, but it wasn't on a
beautiful September day with the light streaming in
through the windows either.)

Looking at the map ahead of time, we'd decided we
wanted to request a room in the Cabanas so we'd be close
to El Centro (Front Desk, Guest Services, restaurants,
etc.) and The Dig Site (the main pool). We usually call
CRO ahead of time to request that they note this
preference in our reservation, but we hadn't the chance
on this trip because of our deadlines. Luckily, we had no
problem securing a room in the Cabanas. The cast member
who checked us in said we could have a room in 8B, but
that it wasn't ready yet (as we expected). So we left our
luggage with bell services, picked up a few maps, and
headed outside to the bus stop.

The bus to Epcot arrived at the bus stop in short
order, and before we knew it they were depositing us at
Epcot. As soon as we were in the gates, it became evident
that it was a slow day at the park. It was virtually
empty, and there were almost as many folks walking around
with press badges as there were regular guests. Hey,
we're not complaining.

Our first stop was Leave a Legacy, where we had our faces
photographed for the metallic tiles that will go on the
Leave a Legacy Sculptures. Read our report of Leave a Legacy
for the juicy details.

By this point, we were famished. We decided to eat
lunch now rather than later, and set our sights on Le
Cellier in the Canada pavilion in World Showcase. On the
way there, we noticed Millennium Central and the Pin
Station kiosk right before the fountain. We also noticed
all the press booths lining the walkway towards Canada.
We decided to walk a bit further to see if Millennium
Village was open, but it was not. Though it was nearly
noon by this point, getting a table at Le Cellier without
a priority seating was no problem. We should note that
the restaurant was busy, however. I ordered the Cheddar
Cheese Soup (yum!) and Field Greens with GrilledChicken
(also good). We enjoyed Le Cellier and plan to write a
review of this restaurant as soon as we find the time. By
this point, my lack of sleep and the climate change was
catching up with me, so it was good to sit in the air
conditioned restaurant.

After lunch, we made a beeline for the Imagination!
Pavilion. We'd heard reports that the new Journey Into
Your Imagination attraction may open a day early, and we
weren't disappointed. The cast member at the door
welcomed us in and we walked right on. Well, we loitered
a bit in the queue taking notes and such, but we could
have walked right on. We ended up riding Journey Into
Your Imagination twice. Our impressions? I thought it was
spotty in places, good in others, and overall just so-so.
Dave liked it more than I, but agreed it was still rough
around the edges. We also plan to write a detailed report
of this new attraction!

We then stopped at the Pin Station at Millennium
Central for a look around. The kiosk is small, but it has
plenty of pins and pin accessories. I drooled over the
pin binder and decided I had to have one even though I'd
made one for myself already. Disney's binder, while much
more expensive ($50), was very cool. The binder has
fabric pockets for the pins. You open the
pocket at the edge, poke the pin through the fabric on
the outside of the pocket, fasten the back of the pin on
the inside of the pocket, and close the pocket (which has
velcro to keep it shut). There are three of these fabric
pockets, and you can use the front and back of the pocket
to attach pins. In addition to these pockets, there are
three mesh, zippered pockets for holding other pins (or
items like patches). In the back of the binder are lots
more pockets, including one that stays shut with velcro.
The binder comes with a shoulder strap and has the WDW
2000 logo embroided on the front. It is about the 8 1/2 x
11 and a few inches thick. I also purchased a pin
lanyard, which is a nylon ribbon that you can
wear about your neck and to which you can attach pins.
The lanyard has Walt Disney World imprinted
in the nylon material. I also picked up one of the many
millennium pins available. They have a millennium pin for
every park, even every resort. And they were all
available at Pin Station. That was a little
disheartening, since having the pins so available makes
collecting less challenging (and thus, less fun), but I
was glad to see they had them.

Our original plan called for us to go to Disney-MGM
Studios from Epcot, but I was tired and we decided to go
back to Coronado Springs first. Upon our return at about
3:30, we found our room ready. We were in room 8581 in
Cabana 8B. It was very near a bus stop (#3), right next
to a quiet pool, close to The Dig Site, and within easy
walking distance of El Centro. Its view wasn't so great
(parking lot), but that hardly mattered on a short trip
like ours. We highly recommend the Cabanas if you're
looking for the best of all worlds at Coronado Springs.

In the room, we took some pictures and then settled
in. Since we were ahead of schedule and both very tired,
we took an hour out to rest. I hopped in the tub for a
cool bath, while Dave took a book out to a hammock on the
sand (which he says he loved). I ended up falling asleep
afterwards, so Dave decided to go to Disney-MGM Studios
without me. I sleepily agreed to meet him at Magic
Kingdom at 6:00 in front of City Hall, then promptly fell
back asleep.

At 5:00 I managed to drag myself out of the depths of
sleep, get dressed, and hop on the bus to Magic Kingdom.
Dave and I met up at 6:00 as planned, and realized there
wasn't much we needed to do at Magic Kingdom after all.
Poor planning, but we were tired, after all. We took the
monorail to the Transportation and Ticket Center and
transferred to a Downtown Disney bus.

We got off at the West Side bus stop at Downtown
Disney and headed towards Pleasure Island and the
Adventurers Club. Alas, the Club was closed until 9:00 pm
for a private function (must be those darned press
events), so we headed to Wolfgang Puck's on the West Side
for dinner. They were busy, but we found two seats at the
bar and ordered California Rolls, satay, and sushi. It
was a nice, impromptu dinner.

The Adventurer's Club was much as it always is, which
is part of its charm, of course. We settled in the comfy
chairs in the Main Salon to observe the goings-on and
order our usual (Long Island Iced Tea for me and Jungle
Juice for Dave). We both really, really like the
Adventurer's Club. It feels like our home
while we're at Disney. We know what to expect at this
point (well, most of the time) and we can relax, knowing
we don't have to take notes or observe anything we don't
feel like observing. Oh, and one of the servers, Ramona,
always recognizes us when we arrive. We find this
astounding, considering how many people she must see and
how relatively infrequently we're there. Nonetheless, it
lends to the feeling of home and we always
feel welcome. We stayed until about 11:00, after which we
decided to head for the room so we could do some work*,
relax, and get to sleep early. We had a big day ahead of
us, the start of the Millennium Celebration!

Once we'd returned, we decided to take advantage of
the World's largest hot tub (the hot tub at The Dig Site
holds 22 people!) and got into our bathing suits. The hot
tub was a little too hot (and popular) for me, so I
retreated to the virtually empty and incredibly huge
swimming pool. It was sheer heaven. After a very long,
tiring day, that cool, luxuriant water was like a balm. I
really recommend going for a swim at the end of the day
if you can.

* While we're at Disney, work on the laptop usually
means reading and replying to e-mail: answering
questions, confirming orders, fulfilling orders (through
our warehouse in Michigan), adding and removing folks to
our mailing list, registering readers, and so on. We also
need to update our Web site, organize our notes and
materials from the day (PassPorter does wonders here),
and check several discussion areas (our own message
board, rec.arts.disney,parks, AOL message boards, and so
on) for any important information or threads we should
respond to. It can take several hours to do just the
basics.

From my PassPorter:

The
weather on our first day was hot and sunny.

The best thing about our first day was getting
to ride Journey Into Your Imagination a day
before it officially opened.

The worst thing about our first day was how
tired I was all day long.

The most interesting thing about our first day
was seeing all the press activities going on
at Epcot while we were there.

The most frustrating thing about our first day
was having to leave Epcot at 4 pm because it
closed for press events.